I love the run up to Christmas.
When DD was small, i used to get out her fabric advent calendar for 1st Dec. Most days, it had a choc ball in it (I used to get nets of festive ones from M&S or Aldi, 3 nets covered the season). But also a free printable colouring sheet or festive maths sheet or wordmining or wordsearch or "how to.." page lots of days....from a combination of crafty sites and homeschooling sites on the web. DD used to enjoy these as part of breakfast time - colouring the pictures round the edge and doing the sums, or she would often do wordmining in bed to distract her brain to get to sleep (from about Y1 to Y5 equivalent).
Some (less frantic) mornings, the paper in the calendar was the first clue in a treasure hunt around the house leading to a pocket money toy (like a McD's happy meal toy) or snack-packet of raisins - 3-5 clues taking her up and down around the house was great fun.
And some other mornings, it was a note of what we would do later in the day - like the Christmas Tree buying day or the tickets for the Santa Train. Or a plan for a carpet picnic as there was a favourite film on that afternoon.
I had a long list of ideas on a page (which I have lost now sorry) of different things to do during December to prepare for Christmas or just have fun. Some needed pre-planning, but lots of others could happen on the fly - so I always had a few different ideas for when we had time and could do something almost every day:
Loads of different craft ideas.
"Make a card for DGranny and DGrandad" - and then write and post them
"Learn a joke or poem for Daddy and tell him at dinner"
Tidy out closets to get rid of too small/young things to make room for new things (and donate old things that were still good to others)
Go shopping to buy a new toy that would be good for someone her age and wrap it for local giving tree collection
Make cookies for local firestation to thank them for keeping us safe all year.
Picnic party/duvet fort building etc in sitting room
Take a walk in local woods and see what nature is doing in winter - collect pine cones/sticks while out
(Another day) Paint pine cones from the walk to make decorations
Festive baking for ourselves
Make Christmas/Birthday treat for classmates
Clean the sitting room together for Santa's visit
Change all the sheets, and put the Christmas sheets on DD's bed
Turn on the radio (or spotify) and have a Christmas disco in the kitchen
Have a teddy bear's picnic and story time
Build something Christmassy with lego
....I know there were loads more but that kind of thing
We had a collection of festive DVDs and books, which were great for quiet time watching and also bedtime. They came out on 1st December and went back into storage when the tree came down on 6th Jan.
I also used to give DD an empty shoebox filled with different coloured strips of paper and sticky tape/stapler (stapler was as she got older) so she could make her own paper chains. It was something she could pull out and do herself without (much) help for 5 minutes while I cooked dinner, or spend an hour on another day when she was interested. But they could go back in the box easily (quickly!) and safely, and over a couple of weeks, she'd end up with a decent length of chains for the hall ceiling decorations.
We used to go to see santa once at my work party, and generally once somewhere else - we went on a steam train trip every second year (great fun but expensive), "Green Santa" planted trees with the DCs in a stately home type place that you entered through a wardrobe into the Narnian woods where it was always winter, that sort of thing.
I always brought DD to do her Xmas shopping one afternoon - her creche was in town before she went to school so I would collect her early and we'd find what she needed for DGPs, DH etc and always stop for hot choc and a bun in a nice coffee shop, and go see the Live Crib outside the Lord Mayor's House. (TBH, we detoured to stop at the Live Crib most days in Dec en route to the bus home once she knew the animals were there). And once she went to primary, I would head out to collect her from school (near home in suburbs) and go back in on the bus to do the same. THis was always about HER shopping and I would do mine in spurts/early mornings on way to work/lunchtimes etc.
I also love going to musical events in December - lots of choirs sing on the streets collecting for charity or have concerts in halls or churches etc. But while DH and DD have both been to some, they are not interested so I do that solo now.
I also love walks in the peace of winter, just seeing the local woods in hibernation. And then going home to a blazing fire, hot drink and mince pies! 
Wrapping night, once DD is in bed (or nowadays, stuck into a match on tv) and DH is out at one of his work events, with festive music on, glass of wine at hand and getting stuck in at the kitchen table. With all my tape, selection of paper, box of ribbons etc..
PLanning the party for my Cub Scout pack (they always pick a fun theme! - we had Pirates of the Carribbean for a picnic in the woods during lockdown, it had been James Bond the previous year in the Den).
And having some other social events - work do's for DH and I, events with volunteer groups we're involved in, and various social gatherings with family, friends and neighbours.